2008 Likely to Open the Mobile Internet World

Signs point to 2008 as the kickoff year for a truly open mobile Internet environment, with Internet giants entering wireless and faster networks being deployed. The wireless Internet promises to change the culture as fully and completely as the wired Internet, iPod or social networking has. That is, provided certain criteria are met, with open access being chief among them.

While many carriers don’t like the idea of open anything, it’s an evolution that is far from threatening for them, as new applications drive data revenue and traffic for service providers. “If we build this and it takes off, it’s a whole new market for goods, services, the long tail — you end up making money not because you have a big piece of the cake, but because the cake is just huge,” explains Tim Berners-Lee, director of the World Wide Web Consortium, in his keynote address at November’s inaugural Mobile Internet World (MIW), which drew close to 2,000 attendees.

Sprint Nextel Senior Vice President Jack Dziak was on hand to discuss open-access models.

Rich Miner, vice president of wireless strategy at Google, said during a lunch discussion at MIW that an open approach still leaves carriers plenty of real estate and opportunities for differentiation, particularly in management and customer care. Trying to judge the gestalt to stay ahead of what consumers want, however, is a losing proposition. “About 80 percent of the content you want is never going to be the pre-edited content that’s available on the handset,” he noted. “So the goal now is taking this message of openness and making it heard and accepted.”

The possibilities are exponential. “There will be a huge number of applications that we can’t even imagine now,” said Berners-Lee. “This may provide a way for scientists to remotely collaborate on curing AIDS or cancer. We must provide a blank sheet of paper [referring to the need for non-carrier-locked open access], because what is built on top of the Internet is far more important than the Internet itself.” Later he added, “No one knows what will take off — but the opportunity for someone to come along with a bright idea to create the next Amazon.com, Skype or iTunes — that’s powerful, and a rich new vein for innovation.”

Berners-Lee also speculated that a pervasive Internet cloud will allow the manipulation of content in new ways. As more pixel screens are deployed in any number of settings, the possibility arises for running content seamlessly between the television, PC, phone, the tops of taxi cabs, pixelboards in Times Square, screens at restaurants, and so on. A rental model for screens could arise, with the ability to pull content over the air to wherever you need it to be, for instance. It could make the loading of PowerPoint presentations at conferences, for example, much easier.

Greg Clayman, MTV’s executive vice president of digital distribution, was one of many top industry players keynoting the conference.

The opportunity is ripe, according to analysts. Consider the hardware predictions, since handset availability is one of the linchpins in adoption: IDC says smartphones will be the fastest-growth segment in handsets, representing 20 to 25 percent of all phones globally by 2011. Strategy Analytics says there will be 3 billion active subscribers — about two-thirds of the planet’s population — by 2010. Upgrades and replacements will make up the bulk of revenue in a saturated market.

“You can’t have a conversation about the mobile Internet without talking about what’s going on in the consumer electronics space,” said Greg Delagi, senior vice president and general manager of Texas Instruments Inc.’s wireless terminals business during his keynote at MIW. “There is a unique value proposition in converging on one device you’re not going to leave home without, which will have portable navigation, video, telemedicine applications for people with chronic health problems, an IP phone client — it’s really the dawn of time when you think about what mobile phones will be capable of, and people will continue to want the latest and greatest.”

One panel at MIW focused on the work that needs to be done to enable the mobile Internet in a meaningful way. And the fact of the matter is, there are a few monolithic challenges in making the mobile Internet a reality, industry players say. To wit, ensuring interoperability and using standards-based approaches. “Right now, handset manufacturers and operators can choose between several stack options, and now we have Google Android to add to it,” said Bill Weinberg, general manager of the Linux Phone Standards (LiPS) Forum. “We’re fighting fragmentation with fragmentation.”

Also, there’s a challenge in creating a mobile version of the Internet that is part of the same Web that everyone knows and loves, but yet is easy to use and works well on the smaller screen, with applications that leverage the mobility aspect to its fullest. Then there’s the problem of the networks to support broadband. 3G coverage is spotty at best, WiMAX is no longer a sure bet and other 4G technologies are a few years away (For more on WiMAX, read Tara Seal's January '08 column "Sprint's Severed Alliance Puts WiMAX on the Ropes."). User interfaces are a sticking point, too.

Then there are the business models — many carriers simply don’t like the idea of open anything. However, there are signs this is beginning to change. For instance, Verizon Wireless has pledged to open its network this year to any device or application. And Sprint Nextel has been championing open access. “We are now finally getting serious about bridging the gap between mobility and the Internet, because a lot of things are hindering adoption,” said Kevin Packingham, Sprint Nextel’s director of business marketing, during the panel. He added that industry efforts up until now have been “half-hearted.” “Finally, we’re starting to view it through the eyes of the consumer, not considering it as a $2.99 per month ARPU boost per application,” he added. “Now, we’re not trying to define what the killer app will be, but we’re allowing this to evolve naturally, to create opportunities for everyone. The right app will be different for different people.”

Taking the themes of the MIW as a whole, some see the advent of the true mobile Internet as inevitable. “Today’s PC may become like the 1950s box radio, which is, obsolete and quaint,” said James Pearce, CTO at dotMobi, at MIW. “The world’s largest social network is the one this device is connected to,” he added, holding up his phone. “We call it telecoms, but it’s a very powerful thing.”

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